Temecula reading program greeted with enthusiasm

TEMECULA -- Writing in a journal helped Maria Reyes cope with
the pain of having seen her beloved cousin shot to death and helped
Tiffony Jacobs deal with the despair of homelessness and abuse.

Getting thoughts and emotions down on paper also played a big
part in turning their lives around from being lost and hopeless
high school students to college graduates and inspirational
speakers, they said.

Journal writing not only can be cathartic, it can change minds
and lives, the two told about 75 people on hand for the kickoff of
the community's annual literacy program at the Temecula Public
Library on Sunday.

"Writing set us free," Reyes said. "It was that simple, and it
was that easy."

In its second year, the Temecula Reads program this year
features a journal writing component, so the program is being
called Temecula Reads, Temecula Writes. This year's featured book
is "The Freedom Writers Diary: How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used
Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them."

In addition to asking residents to read the book, program
coordinators are asking residents to submit their own entries, from
which a communitywide diary will be created.

Reyes, Jacobs, and three other "Freedom Writers" told their
stories Sunday to help launch the two-month program, which also
will include more than a dozen related library and community
events, including discussion groups, movie screenings and field
trips.

Published in 1999, the book is a collection of journal entries
in which at-risk, Long Beach high school students chronicled their
struggles. References to murder, gang violence, substance abuse,
poverty and acceptance are scattered throughout the book.

The book was the result of high school teacher Erin Gruwell's
efforts to inspire her jaded students to overcome any obstacle
standing between them and their dreams.

The book's popularity increased with last year's release of the
film "Freedom Writers," focusing on Gruwell's rookie years teaching
and how she created a sense of hope in teenagers already cynical
about the world.

Freedom Writers Tanya Payne and Kimberlee Morrison said journal
writing helped them accept themselves when others would not, they
said.

They were not accepted by their black peers and accused of
"wanting to be white" because of their good grades and proper use
of English, they told the audience.

Payne said at first she exaggerated and lied in her journal
entries to compete with some of the tragic stories her fellow
students wrote. She said Gruwell could see right through it and
confronted her.

Payne said after that conversation she wrote about what she
knew, what she described as "growing up black in the honor
system."

Morrison told a similar story.

"You always have the choice to accept the way things are or
change things for the better," Morrison said, recounting advice
from Gruwell. "As a Freedom Writer, I experienced wholehearted
acceptance. I learned that my love for writing could be
fostered."

Jacobs spoke about her drug-addicted and abusive father, and of
being homeless while attending school.